Are You Angry?

If you’re a human being existing in the app-living world, you’ve probably played or at least heard of Angry Birds. Where these amazing little creatures came from is beyond me but if you’ve played the game you understand the obsession (Actually they came from Finland but let’s not ruin the mystique). If you have not yet experienced the addictive force that is Angry Birds, here’s a brief overview:

There are several birds living a peaceful existence laying and guarding their own eggs. Apparently, from the loose interpretation I can make of the game’s cartoon plot, the eggs are continuously stolen by a marauding group of gnarly green pigs. The pigs seem to be hauling the eggs off to various structures, castles and lairs they have built out of wood, concrete, rocks, pillars and glass (or is it ice?).

Since none of these creatures have any hands, the birds have no choice but to headbutt the pigs’ defenses to crush them and rescue their eggs. The pigs, in turn, can only defend themselves by wearing construction hats or getting super fat.

There are six different types of birds, each with different abilities. I’ve named most of them according to their obvious traits:

The Red Bird is Cardinal, he doesn’t have much ability other than to fly and knock down things he runs in to.

The Blue Bird is Jay, he actually splits into three birds and can therefor do triple damage.

The Yellow Bird is Tweety, he can fly and then, when prompted, speed up and BLAST through a wall or any pig that gets in his way.

The White Bird is Whitey and he drops an egg that has explosive powers on to the heads of the little piglets.

The Black Bird is Bomby-bird because when he makes impact with something he turns red and gets even angrier and then explodes.

Then there’s a green bird that boomerangs back in to the castle and is annoyingly hard to use and doesn’t even get recognized in the game because apparently he was an afterthought. I call him Annoying Boomerang Bird.

Using the different powers of these birds you travel through seemingly-endless levels of pigs. The pigs, and their various castles, are challenging enough on their own, but to add to the complexity of the game there are hidden golden eggs throughout the game that lead to bonus levels of fun at the end. In addition, the real challenge of the game comes in the star rating of each level.

For each board you complete you are awarded a star according to your final score. The fewer number of birds you use, and the more damage you cause, the higher you score and the more stars you receive. Achieving three stars on every level of the game makes you the Ultimate Angry Bird Champion and the greatest Angry Bird player ever to live. In the interest of full disclosure I have to say that this game has now sucked up hours of my life and my phone’s battery use in trying to reach three stars on every level. Some are damn near impossible (if ANYONE can get through 3-1 I need you to contact me immediately!). I’m pretty sure I’ve developed tendinitis in my thumb from flipping birds back and forth. And I have passed through almost entire classes and meetings without hearing a word anyone said because I was crushing little green pigs.

Over 20 million people have purchase Angry Birds from the iPhone store alone. There are Angry Birds websites, Angry Birds plush dolls and an Angry Birds board game coming out this year. Good luck to you if you have already found this creation. If this is the first you’ve heard about it… well, you take your fate into your own hands when you pick it up. Consider yourselves warned.

5 Responses to Are You Angry?

you named the birds? whitey? no pig names? to the amazement of my teenage guy piano students, i am pretty cool because i have perfect scores in two out of four levels. very close in the other two. problem…..ITS ENOUGH TIME SPENT! will need to attend ab anons soon.

Ha ha… Love it! Angry Boomerang bird frustrates me to no end! You know, if you ever get to the point of desperation, there are video and photo walk-throughs for every level- just google the one you need. I may have done that once or twice when I actually wanted to throw the phone.

Morrine, what’s wrong with Whitey? I pretty much came up with the names as I was writing this. And the pigs are: Fat Pig, Fatter Green Pig, Fat Construction Pig and Fat King Pig.

Carolyn, I have seen the videos. They were not necessary to get through the game the first time but trying to get three stars I have watched the 3-1 video several times and still can’t get that stupid bird to go where he does in the video.

I stopped playing when I got to level 1-20 or 21, can’t remember which, on the Angry Birds Holidays episode. I just can’t get it. I saw on youtube that there is a way, but it requires knocking a pig into a tree like post and the pig exploding. You’ve got to hit it just right, too hard and it bounces off, too easy and it doesn’t explode. I’ve been unable to do it and after many attempts lost all interest in the game.

Coolest new droid thing is at http://www.swype.com. It’s an input system where you just slide your finger along the keyboard to input words. Incredibly cool and much easier and more accurate then the regular soft keyboard. It uses a predictive algorithm to “find” the right word, even when your input seem sloppy. You should check it out if you haven’t got it already.